The Weekly Daf #59
Bava Basra 156-162
Week of 20-26 Adar Sheini 5755 / 22-28 March 1995
By Rabbi Mendel Weinbach, Dean, Ohr Somayach Institutions
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Fit To Be Tied
In addition to the regular type of document used either for the purpose of
divorce or for loans and sales there was once in use another type of
document called a "tied document". Whereas the regular one was written in
an unbroken flow of lines on a sheet of parchment with the witnesses signed
below, the "tied" one was written in a very complicated fashion. After
each written line a line was left blank and folded over the written one.
Then the two were sown together -- "tied" -- and the process was repeated
for the remaining lines and completed with the witnesses signing on the
back of the parchment.
What was the purpose of instituting such a complicated, time-consuming
procedure when a simple document would suffice?
This practice arose in a particular community with many kohanim who were
quick to lose their tempers towards their wives and rush into a divorce.
Since a kohen is forbidden to marry any divorcee, even his own, such an
impetuous move could result in an irreparable domestic tragedy. The Sages
therefore instituted for such a community a divorce document that would
take considerable time to prepare in the hope that during this interval the
enraged kohen would cool off and abandon his plans for divorce.
Once this procedure was established for divorce documents it was extended
to all other legal documents so there would be a uniform practice in that
community. Today it is not the practice to use a "tied document" even when
the divorcing husband is a kohen.
Bava Basra 160b
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Bridging The Generation Gap
"In the place of your fathers will be your children; You (Hashem) will
appoint them princes throughout the land." (Tehillim 45:17)
This is not intended as a law of inheritance which establishes a direct
link between grandfather and grandchild but rather as a blessing which
Hashem bestows upon His righteous servants. This blessing has a number of
dimensions:
1. The righteous will have not only children but grandchildren to inherit
their positions of honor. (Rashbam)
2. The righteous will have children as righteous as themselves and
deserving of inheriting their glory. (Tosefos)
3. What the children of the righteous attain in status and wealth will not
be at the expense of their parents but rather as an ancestral endowment
and they will share glory with their father as princes with a king.
(Ein Yaakov)
4. The children -- all righteous Jews -- will inherit from their fathers
-- the patriarchs Avraham, Yitzchak and Yaakov -- the blessings which
Hashem promised them and they will rule the land of Israel which Hashem
promised our ancestors to give to us. (Maharsha)
Bava Basra 159a
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